Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon - Robert Armitage Sterndale 11 стр.

HABITAT.Java, but said by Jerdon to have been found in Calcutta and Ceylon.

DESCRIPTION.Fur fine woolly, long, bicoloured; above light shining brown, paler below; the free edge of the interfemoral membrane margined with small papillæ.

HABITAT.India (AssamShillong, Khasia hills).

DESCRIPTION.Same size as K. picta, but ears larger; fur uniformly dark above and below, with shining greyish-brown extremities.

Muzzle long; ears often larger than the head, oval, apart; tragus long, acute; crown of head vaulted; feet moderate; wing membrane from base of toes; tail, wholly included in interfemoral membrane, less than length of head and body.

Dentition: Inc., 22/6; can., 11/11; premolars, 33/33; molars, 33/33.

HABITAT.N.W. Himalayas.

DESCRIPTION.Fur above light reddish or smoke brown beneath dusky white, the base of the hairs dark.

SIZE.Head and body, 2½ inches; tail, 2 inches; expanse, 15 inches.

Both these appear to be closely allied to the pipistrelle of Europe, and are stated to have been found at Mussoorie and in Kashmir.

HABITAT.Kashmir (caves of Bhima Devi, 6000 feet).

DESCRIPTION.Wings from the ankles; feet very large, about one-fourth the length of the head and body; fur black above, underneath black with whitish tips.

SIZE.Head and body, 1·75 inch; tail, 1·45 inch.

HABITAT.Himalayas.

DESCRIPTION.Muzzle narrow; skull vaulted; ears as long as head, wings from base of toes; fur dark brown.

HABITAT.Himalayas, Arracan.

DESCRIPTION.Similar to the above, but may be distinguished by a small lobe behind the heel, by the deep emargination of the upper third of the outer margin of the ear; by the intensely black colour of the fur and membranes, and by its small size.Dobson.

SIZE.Head and body, 1·6 inch; tail, 1·55 inch.

HABITAT.Burmah, Hotha, Yunan.

DESCRIPTION.Head slightly elevated above the face line; muzzle obtuse; ears narrow, tapering, with rounded tips slightly turned outwards; tragus long, narrow, and acutely pointed; feet very small; toes two-thirds the length of the whole foot; tail wholly contained in the membrane; wings from base of toes; fur dark brown above, the tips paler and shining, beneath much darker, almost black, with ashy tips to the hairs; face much covered with hair, which almost conceals the eyes; the tip of the nose alone naked; wing membranes partially covered with fur.

SIZE.Head and body, 1·8 inch; tail, 1·6 inch.

This bat, of which the above description is taken from Dobson's monograph, was obtained by Dr. J. Anderson during the Yunan Expedition.

HABITAT.N.W. Himalayas (Chamba), 3000 feet.

DESCRIPTION.General form of the ear triangular, with narrow rounded tips; outer margin concave beneath tips; tragus slender and acutely pointed, with a quadrangular lobe at the base of the outer margin; fur dark brown above with light brown tips; dark brown below, almost black with greyish tips.

SIZE.Head and body, 2·5 inches; tail 2.

HABITAT.N.W. Himalayas (Nepal, Darjeeling), Khasia hills.

DESCRIPTION.Wing membrane broad and variegated with orange and rich dark brown; the portions of the dark-coloured membrane are triangular in form, and occupy the spaces between the second and third and third and fourth fingers; all the remaining portions of the membranes, including interfemoral, are orange, as are also the ears; the orange colour extends in narrow lines along each side of the fingers, and is dispersed over the dark triangular space in dots and streaks.

SIZE.Head and body, 2 inches; tail, 1·1; expanse 11.

HABITAT.Khatmandu, Nepal.

DESCRIPTION.Fur of head and back long and dense, bicoloured; base black, tips brown; underneath the hairs are two-thirds black, with the remaining upper third pure white.

SIZE.Head and body, 1·65 inch; tail, 1·35.

HABITAT.Beluchistan.

DESCRIPTION.The upper third of the outer margin of the ears deeply emarginate; colour of fur light brownish; ears and interfemoral membranes pale yellowish white; membranes dusky white.

SIZE.Head and body, 2 inches; tail 1·6.

DESCRIPTION.Crown of head abruptly and very considerably raised above the face line; ears separate, rhomboidal, the outer margin carried forward to the angle of the mouth; tragus like that in Vesperugo; first phalanx of the second or longest finger very short; feet long and slender; tail as long as head and body, wholly contained in the membrane.

Dentition: Inc., 22/6; can., 11/11, premolars, 22/33, molars, 33/33.

HABITAT.Burmah and Ceylon.

DESCRIPTION.Colour of fur varies, the basal half of the hair always dark greyish black, dark brown or black; the extremities varying from light grey to light reddish-grey, dark reddish-brown and black. For further details see Dobson's monograph.

Ears large, connate at the base in front, triangular, emarginate on the outer margin, broad, concealing the back of the head, hairy in the middle; tragus broad at the base, narrow at the tip, and curved outwardly.

Dentition: Inc., 22/6; can., 11/11; premolars, 22/22; molars, 33/33.

HABITAT.Himalayas, Nepal and Mussoorie.

DESCRIPTION.Fur above blackish brown; the hairs fulvous at the tips; abdomen greyish brown; hairs fine silky.

SIZE.Head and body, 2 inches; tail, 1-2/12; expanse; 10½.Jerdon.

This is the same as the English Barbastelle, and it appears in Dobson's monograph as Synotus Darjeelinensis.

HABITAT.Mussoorie.

Jerdon here goes back to the nose-leafed bats. I can find no trace of it in Dobson's monograph, which is so exhaustive as far as Asiatic species are concerned.

DESCRIPTION.Over the eyes, at the hind corner, a tuft of black hair; fur dark brown, above throat and flank brownish-white; below black with white tips. A simple transverse nose-leaf; ears large, ovoid, united at base as in Plecotus.

SIZE.Head and body, 1¾ to 2 inches; tail, 1-5/12; expanse, 9¾.

We have now concluded our notice of Indian bats but yet much is to be discovered concerning them. Very little is known of the habits of these small nocturnal animals, only a few of the most familiar large ones are such as one can discourse upon in a popular way; the lives and habits of the rest are a blank to us. We see them flit about rapidly in the dusky evening, and capture one here and there, but, after a bare description, in most cases very uninteresting to all save those who are "bat fanciers," what can be said about them? Many of them have been written about for a century, yet how little knowledge has been gained! It has been no small labour to collate all the foregoing species, and to compare them with various works; it would have been a most difficult task but for the assistance I have received from Dr. Dobson's book, which every naturalist should possess if he desires to have a thorough record of all the Indian Chiroptera.

These are mostly small animals of, with few exceptions, nocturnal habits.

Their chief characteristic lies in their pointed dentition, which enable them to pierce and crush the hard-shelled insects on which they feed. The skull is elongated, the bones of the face and jaw especially, and those of the latter are comparatively weak. Before we come to the teeth we may notice some other peculiarities of this order.

The limbs are short, feet five-toed and plantigrade, with the entire sole placed on the ground in running, and these animals are all possessed of clavicles which in the next order are but rudimentary; in this respect they legitimately follow the Bats. The mammæ are placed under the abdomen, and are more than two. None of them (except Tupaia) have a cæcum (this genus has been most exhaustively described in all its osteological details by Dr. J. Anderson: see his 'Anatomical and Zoological Researches'); the snout is usually prolonged and mobile. The dentition is eccentric, and not always easy to determine; some have long incisors in front, followed by other incisors along the sides of their narrow jaws and canines, all shorter than the molars; others have large separated canines, between which are placed small incisors. In Blyth's additions to Cuvier he states that "in this group we are led to identify the canine tooth as simply the first of the false molars, which in some has two fangs, and, as in the Lemurs, to perceive that the second in the lower jaw is in some more analogous in size and character to an ordinary canine than that which follows the incisors. The incisor teeth are never more than six in number, which is the maximum throughout placental mammalia (as opposed by marsupial), and in several instances one or two pairs are deficient. (It should be remarked that a single tooth with two fangs is often represented by two separate teeth, each with one fang.) The canines, with the succeeding false molars, are extremely variable, but there are ordinarily three tuberculated molars posterior to the representative of the carnivorous or cutting grinder of the true Carnivora." All the molar teeth are studded with sharp points or cusps; the deciduous teeth are developed and disappear before birth. This order is divided into four families, viz., Talpidæ or Moles, Sorecidæ or Shrews, Erinaceidæ or Hedgehogs, and the Tupaiadæ, Banxrings or Tree-shrews. Of all these well-defined types are to be found in India, but America and Africa possess various genera which we have not, such as the Condylures (Condylura, Illiger), the Shrew-moles (Scalops, Cuvier), belonging to Talpidæ; the Solendons, Desmans, and Chrysochlores to Sorecidæ; the Sokinahs, Tenrecs and Gymnures to Erinaceidæ; and the Macroscelles or Elephant-mice of the Cape Colony form another group more allied to Tupaia than the rest. This last family is the most interesting. Anatomically belonging to this order, they externally resemble the squirrels so closely as to have been frequently mistaken for them. The grovelling Mole and creeping Shrew are as unlike the sprightly Tupaia, as it springs from branch to branch, whisking its long bushy tail, as it is possible to conceive. I intend further on to give an illustration of this little animal. The first we have on record concerning it is in the papers relating to Captain Cook's third voyage, which are now in the British Museum, where the animal is described and figured as Sciurus dissimilis; it was obtained at Pulo Condore, an island 100 miles from Saigon, in 1780.

Sir T. Stamford Raffles was the next to describe it, which he did under the generic name Tupaiatupai being a Malayan word applied to various squirrel-like small animalsbut he was somewhat forestalled in the publication of his papers by MM. Diard and Duvaucel. Dr. Anderson relates how Sir T. Raffles engaged the services of these two naturalists to assist him in his researches, on the understanding that the whole of the observations and collections were to be the property of the East India Company; but ultimately on this point there arose a disagreement between them, and the paper that was first read before the Asiatic Society of Bengal on the 10th of March, 1820, was drawn up by MM. Diard and Duvaucel, though forwarded by Sir T. Raffles, whose own paper on the subject was not read before the Linnean Society until the 5th of December of that year, nor published till 1821; therefore to the others belongs the credit of first bringing this curious group to notice.

They regarded it in the light of a true Shrew, disguised in the form and habits of a squirrel, and they proposed for it the name Sorex-Glis, i.e. Shrew-squirrel (Glis properly means a dormouse, but Linnæus used it for his rodential group which he termed Glires); this was afterwards changed by Desmarest and Giebel to Gli Sorex and Glisosorex, which latter stands for one of the generic terms applied to the group. F. Cuvier, objecting to Tupaia, proposed Cladobates (signifying branch walkers), and Temminck, also objecting to Tupaia, suggested Hylogale (from Gr. hyla, forest, and gale, a weasel), so now we have four generic names for this one small group. English naturalists have however accepted Tupaia; and, as Dr. Anderson fairly remarks, though it is a pity that some definite rules are not laid down for the guidance of naturalists for the acceptance or rejection of terms, still those who reject Tupaia on the ground of its being taken from a savage tongue should be consistent, and refuse all others of similar origin. He is quite right; but how many we should have to reject if we did soSiamanga in Quadrumana, Kerivoula in Cheiroptera, Tupaia in Insectivora, Golunda in Rodentia, Rusa in Ruminantia, and others! At the same time these names are wrong; they convey no meaning; and had they a meaning (which only Kerivoula or Kelivoulha, i.e. plantain-bat, has) it is not expressed in languages common to all western nations, such as the Latin and Greek. Tupaia is an unfortunate selection, inasmuch as it does not apply to one type of animal, but reminds me somewhat of the Madras puchi, which refers, in a general way, to most creeping insects, known or unknown.

These animals have a small cylindrical body, very short arm attached to a large shoulder-blade, supported by a stout clavicle or collar-bone. The fore-feet are of great breadth, supported by the powerful muscles of the arm; the palm of the foot or hand is directed outwards or backwards, the lower edge being trenchant, with scarcely perceptible fingers armed with long, flat nails, strong and sharp, with which to tear up the ground and shovel the earth aside. The hind feet are small and weak in comparison, with slender claws. The head tapers to a point, the long snout being provided with a little bone which assists it in rooting, and the cervical muscles are very strong. The eyes are microscopical, and almost concealed in the fur. At one time it was a popular delusion that the mole was devoid of the power of sight, but this is not the case. The sense of hearing is extremely acute, and the tympanum is large, although externally there is no aural development. The tail is short, the fur set vertically in the skin, whence it is soft and velvety. The bones of the pubis do not join, and the young when produced are large. The mammæ are six in number. The jaws are weak, the incisors are six above and eight below. The canines (false molars?) have two roots. There are four false molars above and three below, and three molars with pointed cusps.